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The Forum > Article Comments > Atlas of Australia > Comments

Atlas of Australia : Comments

By Viv Forbes, published 31/7/2012

Every living thing is in fierce competition for access to soil and water. On land, the big contestants in this battle for space are grass, herbs and trees.

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I sometimes have to double check myself for irony coming off the page but the sentences such as the original Aborigines 'sailed' to Australia and casting them as 'graziers' seems not so much ironic as bizarre.

Viv, I'm with you 100 per cent on bureaucrats and Brunswick Street Greenies but, alas, the Aborigines were hunters and gatherers.

I sense Viv's frustration. I remember eons ago attending a private school and the children of graziers arrived each term in new mercedes benz and rolls royces. Strangely, we didn't see many of the 'original graziers'.
Posted by Cheryl, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 8:08:17 AM
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Wow! It's quite a feat of selective myopia to write an entire article about Australia's screwed-up farming sector without once mentioning globalisation. Unlimited tree clearing and grass growing and water rights and greenie bashing are never going to bring back all those farmers' mercs.

Farmers are caught in a bind. They vote for the ultra-conservative political parties who are ideologically committed to global free trade, deregulation, privatisation and big business. These in turn are committed to driving down the value of farm labour and productivity, so that small agricultural players can no longer compete in a global market - thus paving the way for global agribusiness to step in and buy up farms at bargain basement prices. Their mates in the corporate media have the job of demonising the very political parties and movements that are fighting and challenging this process every step of the way.
Posted by Killarney, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 8:41:37 AM
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Killarney,

Spot on!
Posted by Poirot, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 8:58:11 AM
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So….. is this article written with tongue firmly planted in cheek or does the author have some very serious hangups??

I don’t think it is a TIC article. (:>?

One of the great faults with the way that many people think about stuff like this is their highly polarised thought processes. In their minds, it has to be all or nothing.

All greenies are bad, all bureaucrats are bad, all urbanised people are fools!

Viv, I think that you immediately destroy your credibility with this sort of expression.
Posted by Ludwig, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 10:28:09 AM
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The author betrays a tremandous ignorance by the following statement:

"Every species in Australia arrived here as a "feral" invader, colonized vacant territory and pushed aside weaker occupants."

Every species in Australia did not arrive here as a "feral" invader. Australia is a large land mass surrounded by ocean, and many of the species that exist in Australia evolved here. Most of the Greenies he is so vehement against have enough knowledge of biological science to be aware of that. They understand the relation between species and habitat. Indigenous Australian species evolved to adapt to the habitat, and the habitat was changed by the species. Of course it never is a static situation as Greenies and others interested in conservation are aware of. It is easy for the ignorant to maintain that others are just as ignorant.

There was no vacant territory to colonize [sic] as life exists everywhere on the Australian landmass. Some Australian species such as the various species of kangaroo have done quite well and have held there own against species that have arrived more recently.

The author might do well to learn some basic biology.
Posted by david f, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 10:42:58 AM
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Viv perhaps you should remember that attempting to undertake traditional European farming practices in Australia was always going to be a difficult task.

Western Australia is a great case in point. Great swathes of former woodland have been cleared since European settlement, now tenuously supporting wheat and sheep farming. Yields are becoming more and more difficult to maintain without greater and greater inputs of fossil fuelled derived herbicides, pesticides and fertiliser.

Historical rainfall has dropped in correlation with land clearing and most of the natural micro-climates have been disrupted, not to mention the problem of increasing salt in the landscape from tree clearing.

To blame greenies, bureaucrats and those urban dwellers is a naive approach to a much bigger problem.

Back to school for you Viv.
Posted by Geoff of Perth, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 11:50:29 AM
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Killarney and Poirot

Your posts are bizarre.. Australia had an extensive system of protecting agriculture, called agarian socialism.. it was part of a vast system of political back scratching, crony capitalism and deals in the Melbourne club that ruled until well into the 1980s. The bulk of it including most of the agricultural protection has been swept away for the very good reason that it was just too expensive to maintain, not to mention counter productive.

While you may romaticise the small farmer we were basically paying to keep him or her in operation. A point you should remember..
Posted by Curmudgeon, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 12:07:51 PM
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The most recent invaders are the foreigners buying up our land.

I don't care who they are: Chinese, US, UK, New Zealand.......

I hear about more and more countries in which foreigners can buy NO land. Samoa, Indonesia, Switzerland, etc etc.

How would we go buying a large farm in China? Or the US?

Let's keep our land for our children and grandchildren.
Tony Abbott was right. Foreign investment is welcome- as long as there are stricter controls. This Foreign Investment Review Board is a joke.

Australia for the Australians.
Posted by Bronte, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 1:22:18 PM
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Curmudgeon,

Killarney has offered a valuable and valid observation (though I'm not keen on the 'merc' shot) - our farmers are increasingly under threat from the impacts of globalisation, free trade, level playing field and a host of vested-interest lobby groups, as well as a continuation of governments focused myopically on GNP, balance of trade and international back-scratching. Just as in the mining sector, our principal agricultural interests are heading down the path of multinational domination.

As for your shot about farming subsidies, you forget that, prior to the rise and rise of the mining boom, Oz did ride on the sheep's back - heavily dependent on our agricultural exports, and hence some subsidisation was indeed highly productive. You also forget that both the US and Europe have been, and remain, far more involved in agricultural subsidisation than Oz has ever been. Go figure?

The author's piece may be imperfect as to historical fact, and even in the failure to recognise the value of trees of the right kind and in the right place, but our farming sector is under threat - from mining, from potential damage to water sources from 'fracking', from pests and hazard emanating from poorly managed national parks, and from some segments of native vegetation conservation regulations. (Inability to hazard-reduce roadside verges without a permit - who would figure?)

Do our bureaucrats and politicians pay sufficient attention to the needs and best interests of our farming sector, and to the contribution of this sector to our present and future food security interests? It would seem not. Orange groves bulldozed because of concentrate imports; $3/kilo beef on the hook and $8-$36/Kg in Coles; milk and other fresh produce on sale at near production cost - the farmer forced into a near loss on every Kg/Litre. Mercs? In your dreams.

City jobs and wages pull the young off the land, away from the slave labour farming reality; independent farmers an endangered species; tax lurks convert farms to scrub; private equity and capital markets reign supreme, and overseas auto manufacturers gain short-term subsidies. Welcome to the 'future bus'.
Posted by Saltpetre, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 2:03:48 PM
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This article is the most upside down thinking!

Graziers and farmers et al are the FERALS. Ferals with GUNS.

That means if you demand justice, whether you are a tree, a species, a freeman , a slave or most of all a native Australian you will be cut down or shot.

Good riddance to Australian farmers. As prime minister I would give aboriginals the right to walkabout North to South to follow the Sun and THEIR timeless and culture sustaining Thermodynamic Entropy gradients. I would nationalise farming with the best Chinese and European farmers as managers and workers. Further, schoolchildren will be rotated on and off these farms & indeed Australia's mines and great assets like Lake Eyre for biodiversity remediation & educational experience & instruction at regular intervals for coursework. And in drought or plenty all our farm workers will get full pay and benefits but not the mercedes.

Additionally, high water use options like cotton and rice will be fully removed from vulnerable water tables to Nth Australian river schemes along with employment opportunities.

The tide of biased & unnecessary immigration is undermining Australia's precious historical Anglo history. If we are to lose it to attrition and multi uncultural invason as time and foolish Government decisions destine, then it would be wiser to make drastic moves ourselves & now. Either way farmers are redundant, outmoded and obstructive. Every other Caltex and Ford worker get stuff all and the boot. Why farmers aren't treated the same way is just ludicrous. If they fit in with the new paradigm they would be a national asset but currently they are leaden weights in our Economic, Environmental, Indigenous and Justice and Sustainability objectives.

This will be competitive with Chinese communism, but every bit as capitalist as a Caltex mass redundancy decision or NSW Govt.
Barangaroo or M7 jobs boondoggles.

IE we'll still be Australian.

But change must come at our hands.

Its TIME!
Posted by KAEP, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 2:04:38 PM
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...I stand as one to applaud this article; and with pride now, (as never before), see my long and continuous (at times un-illustrious) role in society as a feral, finally acknowledged and legitimised by science. I can also attest to negative effect of any stand against the bureaucrats, as often confining and constraining; and I don’t profess to be a farmer!

...Be assured the authors’ is a more universal complaint against official interference, proven over and over in all walks of life, by those surviving determinists unable to co-exist in a world overruled and overregulated.
Posted by diver dan, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 2:18:56 PM
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Well tonight I am going home to kiss the wife and dog, have a feed, turn the heater on and thank God I live now on this 'devastated' British ruined country. I will be thankful I am not sitting by a fire in nakedness wondering if I can sharpen my spear enough to feed the family tomorrow. On the way home I might drop into one of the 'évil ' corporations where I can buy some nice meat and milk. I might even thank God that it was the British who came here and despite their imperfections have built along with other immigrants a land that most of the world want to come to.
Posted by runner, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 2:26:52 PM
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Saltpetre

no, you're missing the main point of most of our recent economic history. Farmers are a significant lobby group in their own right and until the mid-80s, their lobbying power resulted in extensive protection. That protection has been stripped away, as it has been for many other sectors.

Australia has largely abandonded its protectionist approach, and farmers are no different to any other sector. They have been left to the mercy of the free market system but that is a good thing. They will adapt and Australia will be the stronger for it, or find some other occupation. Hard if you're a farmer, of course, but if those who fail to adapt leave their farms and get jobs elsewhere then they will be better off.

To interfere with the market's decision in these matters is to ask for expensive trouble. Are you willing to pay to protect farmers? If so, how much?

No, Killarney does not have a valid point.
Posted by Curmudgeon, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 5:02:41 PM
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Viv, you need to understand your readership here on OLO includes people whose stupidity is so profound that they think food is made cheaper by restricting food production and subsidising loss-making food production. Yes, they really are that dumb, and vocal with it. But they never seem to volunteer to go without food themselves, do they? They just think it would be a wonderful idea for other people to (be forced to) do.
Posted by Peter Hume, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 6:08:30 PM
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various species of kangaroo have done quite well and have held there own against species that have arrived more recently.
david f,
Yes because of the clearing of bush & the creation of fertile land by another introduced species
Posted by individual, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 8:03:32 PM
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<< Viv perhaps you should remember that attempting to undertake traditional European farming practices in Australia was always going to be a difficult task. >>

Indeed, Geoff of Perth.

The methodology and the intensity of farming in southwestern WA, in an area with soils of low fertility and barely adequate rainfall to start with, was always going to produce enormous problems.

Trouble is; most of those problems have long lag times and have only fairly recently become realised, such as chronic salinity and reduced rainfall.

Of course as things get harder, there are more and more restrictions applied by law. Farmers no longer have free rein over what they can do on their properties, and rightly so.

Blaming environmentalists and bureaucrats is just so counter-intuitive.

What about the Landcare movement, where farmers have realised that a great deal of remedial work needs to be done and have worked hand in hand with greenies and government.

Here’s an interesting exercise.

Google ‘Bremer River, Western Australia', which is where Viv Forbes hails from.

Switch from ‘map’ to ‘satellite’ and have a look at the intensity of clearing and farming in this part of the world.

Apart from Fitzgerald River National Park, Stirling Range National Park and Lake Magenta Nature Reserve, the land is almost entirely cleared!

Scroll to the northwest and then north up through the wheatbelt and get a perspective of how massively this huge area has been 'de-ecologised' and almost totally humanised.

There was no thought of environmental balance when this land was cleared, only of 100% human utilisation.

So it is no wonder that salinity and various other problems have come home to roost.

Lots of environmentalists, public servants and academics are and have been trying very hard for years to deal with this. The last thing they need is blanket condemnation from the likes of Mr Forbes.
Posted by Ludwig, Tuesday, 31 July 2012 8:39:19 PM
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This sir is without doubt the BEST article I have ever seen on OLO. Well done and I hope you keep it up. It's unfortunate some focus on the minutiae and exclude the message, akin to those focusing on spelling mistakes and ignoring the poetry

"our farmers are increasingly under threat from the impacts of globalisation, free trade, level playing field and a host of vested-interest lobby groups"

That's the thinking of those not involved. They are under threat by those that think they know better, like some of those posting here and bureaucrats who employ more bureaucrats to write more reports to employ more of them. For example, an article yesterday in "The Land", 100 pages of documentation to move a piece of farm equipment from one farm to another.

The sheer number of bureaucrats and the Greens (who are in reality NIMBYs) eg Keep all the trees while they buy imported food, raped from a 3rd World country, more fishing marine parks, less fishing, increase fish imports from SE Asia etc etc

As to the poster about needing so much more "chemical inputs", of course they do ! Everything grown consumes nutrients, you want several crops from a field, the nutrients have to be replaced, it's simple math not an environmental disaster. Modern no till farming is wonderful. If you get rid of herbicides, you would decrease production enormously, leading to a need to increase clearing and much more expensive food and increased starvation levels.

In my area of Northern NSW, every farmer is an OAP. When they want to sell the farm, they need to sell it to a Chinese buyer, Aussies prefer living in the City, they don't want to buy into farming. More food imports ?
Posted by Valley Guy, Saturday, 11 August 2012 2:14:48 PM
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